


if you believe in magic, don't bother to choose

by somehowunbroken



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Curses, Getting Back Together, M/M, Magical Realism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 08:27:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18028274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somehowunbroken/pseuds/somehowunbroken
Summary: There's no way breaking a curse in Edmonton isn't going to be awkward, and Dylan knows it. It's probably too late to back out now, though.





	if you believe in magic, don't bother to choose

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skyscraperblue](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skyscraperblue/gifts).



> -HI FRIEND HI! oh man, i hope you enjoy this <3 <3
> 
> -thanks to a. and r. for last-minute beta help <3 <3 <3
> 
> -title from "[do you believe in magic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUljHEpeIgs)" by the lovin' spoonful. i'm not even sorry, that's the worst part.

There's rumblings about a curse. Of course there are; it's Edmonton, and they've seen curses, they've known them and felt them and lived them before. This probably wouldn't be any different Dylan thinks, except the magic team for the Oilers had _broken_ the curse a couple seasons ago, and they'd made the playoffs and gone pretty far, even. They'd fixed things, but here they are again: losing in pretty ugly ways, leaving points on the table and watching another season drain away.

It's why Dylan's here. It's why he and Mitch are here, more specifically; the Oilers have fired enough people from the front office to get desperate, and nothing screams desperation like calling a curse-breaking team from halfway across the country to come in for a consult just because they advertise in a bunch of sports-related areas.

"Dude," Mitch says from beside Dylan as they walk towards Rogers Place. "This is still real, right?"

Dylan snorts. "I can pinch you again if you think that would help."

"Dude," Mitch repeats, and yeah, okay, Dylan sort of gets it. It _is_ crazy, the first-class flight to Edmonton and the pretty nice chauffeured ride to the arena and Bob Nicholson himself meeting them in the parking lot and hurriedly shaking their hands before heading for the players' entrance.

"Now we just have to fix it," Dylan says, and he knows that Mitch will hear right through the bullshit confidence he's projecting.

Sure enough, Mitch huffs out a laugh. "No pressure," he says as Nicholson holds open a door for them.

"No pressure," Dylan repeats, stepping up and walking in after Nicholson.

He has to stop immediately; it feels like he's choking, something cloying wafting into his nose and mouth and throat, and Dylan gasps and throws a hand out as Mitch stumbles into his back. It's a slick, oily feeling on the backs of his hands, his face, the insides of his lungs, and Dylan's never felt sicker in his entire life than he does in that instant.

"Here, here," Mitch says from somewhere far away, and a split-second later something solid touches his lips. Dylan opens his mouth and bites down immediately, and the taste of spearmint cuts through the oil, sluicing it away from his body. Dylan gasps, and Mitch is right there, grabbing Dylan's hand and tugging him gently towards a wall so he can lean against it while he catches his breath. 

"What was that?" Nicholson asks, clearly bewildered as he takes a step towards them. Seconds, Dylan realises dimly. It probably hadn't even taken long enough for it to register as more than weird sounds behind Nicholson as he led them into the arena.

"Dylan found it," Mitch says, tone grim. "Whatever it is, Mr. Nicholson, it's pretty powerful."

"Yeah," Dylan agrees. His voice isn't noticeably hoarse, but that's probably more due to the gum in his mouth than anything else. He glances to Mitch. "We did _not_ bring enough sage."

"There's not enough sage in the province," Mitch says flatly. "Maybe not in all of western Canada."

"What does that mean?" Nicholson asks, and when Dylan looks at him, he doesn't look angry or upset or scared, none of the expressions that people usually have on their faces when they hear that they are very definitely cursed apparent on his face. He just looks tired, and honestly, that tracks with what Dylan knows about Edmonton and everything that's been going on here.

"It means we're gonna get more of a sense of what's going on here, and then we're going to decide if we need backup," Dylan says. He takes a step away from the wall and doesn't immediately feel like he's going to fall over, so he's actually doing better than he thought. "We're good, man. We're experts. We are not the best curse-breakers in the country."

"But," Mitch adds, finishing Dylan's train of thought as if they'd practised it, "we do know the best curse-breaker in the country, and if we need him…"

Dylan grins. "He's local," he says. "We'll get this figured out." _Or die trying_ , he adds mentally, but that's probably not a thing he needs to worry about.

Probably.

-0-

Dylan's on his third piece of gum by the time they make it off the ice, and he honestly still can't believe that it's working as well as it is. He's pretty traditional when it comes to his herbs and stuff, but Mitch is the absolute definition of new age, believing in the spirit of the rule rather than the actual rule. It's interesting for both of them to work together, but Dylan will take all the spearmint gum he can find if it means he doesn't have to chomp down on leaves while he's trying to skate around and figure out what, exactly, is screwing with the Oilers.

"Someone hates the _fuck_ out of this team, huh," Mitch observes as they sit on the Oilers' bench, looking out at the ice. Now that Dylan knows what he's looking for, it's easy to see the thin layer of slick oil over everything, spilled across the ice and somehow pouring up the boards, over the other side, up the stairs of the lower bowl. There's nothing it isn't touching, but there's also no place where it seems to be thicker or more centred. It's just everywhere, and that means there's no good place to start un-slicking everything.

"So, facts," Dylan says, leaning forward and resting his arms against the half-board. "One: the Oilers have some sort of oil curse."

"Presumption one: someone's got a really dumb sense of humour," Mitch says. "Seriously. Why would you not go with something fire-based? That's fed by oil. That would have been way worse."

Dylan turns to glare at him. "Let's maybe not give anyone ideas."

"I'm just saying," Mitch says, grinning, and it's honestly why they work so well, this push-and-pull that's so familiar and so grounding at the same time. Dylan loves him a whole lot, basically, but it doesn't mean that he doesn't sometimes want to make him stop talking.

"Fact two: we can't find any kind of spell mark," Dylan says, barrelling on. "Either we're not looking hard enough or we're dealing with someone way smarter than we were hoping for."

"We kind of figured on that," Mitch says, shrugging. "If it was easy, they'd've fixed it already. They wouldn't have had to call us in if anyone could fix it."

Dylan sighs. "Fact three: if we have to call in backup…"

"Yeah," Mitch says after a moment. "That might be, like. Awkward as fuck, right?"

"That's one way of putting it," Dylan says, trying not to let his voice sound as grim as he thinks it probably does. "I'd rather do it without help, but if we need it…"

"Hey," Mitch says, and it's his serious voice. He touches Dylan's knee, brief and reassuring, and when Dylan looks over, he's smiling faintly. "We'll try not to need it, and it we do, I'll make sure I stay between you, okay?"

It makes Dylan smile, which is almost definitely what Mitch was going for. "Okay," he says. "I think it'll just be awkward over your head—"

"Oh, fuck you, I'm not _that_ short," Mitch says, but Dylan's laughing, and Mitch is smiling the little crinkly-eyed smile that made Dylan fall for him in the first place, and all Dylan can taste is mint, so all in all, it could be a lot worse.

-0-

"So the good news is that we know a guy," Mitch says. He doesn't elaborate on the bad news, but he really doesn't have to with an introduction like that. They're in Nicholson's office after a thorough sweep of the entire building; it's in the locker room, every hallway, the management suite. There's no concentrated place that they can find, which means it's going to be harder to dispel it. Even with the combined things that he and Mitch can do together, Dylan knows that they don't have enough to combat something that's spread as far through the building as this has, something that's sunk into the concrete and steel of the arena.

Nicholson sighs. "Okay," he says. "It's that bad?"

"No offense, man, but you had to kind of be expecting this," Dylan says. "I'm taking a wild guess here that we're not the first curse-breaking team you've had in to look at things."

"You're not," Nicholson agrees. "You were recommended, though. I know Sakic."

"That'll do it," Mitch says neutrally. The Avalanche thing had been one hell of a curse; they'd been a little too confident, and they'd both come out of it alive, but Dylan knows damn well that's more due to luck than anything they'd done. He can still feel the way Mitch's hand had gone slack in his own if he doesn't actively stop himself from remembering it.

"But this is worse than that?" Nicholson asks. "Worse than the thing in Denver?"

Mitch looks at Dylan; they're not psychic, for all that they've been accused of it over the years, but they've been in business together for a few years, have been dating for longer than that. It's easy to read someone who knows you better than you know yourself, so Dylan sighs after a moment and turns back to Nicholson. "Not worse," he hedges. "Not better, though. Definitely bigger."

"Bigger," Nicholson echoes, leaning back in his chair. It creaks slightly as he surveys them. "And you need this other person? A local, you said?"

"He's local right now," Dylan says evasively. "He's the best either of us has ever met. Better than pretty much everyone else out there right now, actually."

Nicholson frowns. "It's not that I don't believe you," he says, tone clearly saying the opposite, "but if there was someone that good already here, we wouldn't have called you. No offense."

"He's got a day job," Mitch says. "He doesn't actually practise magic. He's got other stuff going on, so it's not surprising that you don't know about him."

"You won't have to pay extra to get him here," Dylan adds. "He's, uh. He's pretty invested in the Oilers, actually, so he'll do it without you shelling out more money."

"Who is he?" Nicholson asks. The frown hasn't left his face.

Dylan immediately shakes his head. "We're not going to tell you that, not until we've talked to him," he says. "Professional courtesy kind of thing. If he wanted people to know he was that powerful with magic, he'd be a curse-breaker, y'know?"

"He'll help us, and then you'll know," Mitch adds. "He's not gonna turn us away."

"You're pretty confident about that," Nicholson says. "How confident?"

"On a scale from one to ten, a ten," Dylan says evenly. He doesn't let himself look around the office; he just keeps his gaze trained on Nicholson's face. He can't give anything away if he's focusing on the guy in front of him. "He's not going to say no. There's a zero percent chance he says no."

Nicholson sighs, a gusty, weary thing. "Okay," he relents. "Talk to your guy, and then let me know what kind of timeline we're looking at, okay? The team is here for morning skate already, and we've got a game tomorrow. I'm not expecting miracles, but an idea of what we're looking at would be nice."

"We'll let you know," Mitch says, standing. "Hopefully soon. The team is already here, you said?"

"They should be, yeah," Nicholson says. "If you can't work around them, just say something to someone on the coaching staff. We'll get everyone out of your way."

"Thanks," Dylan says. He stands, too, and steels himself as he walks towards the door. "We'll let you know."

-0-

"Want me to ask?" Mitch offers. They're just standing in a hallway in the bowels of Rogers Place, and Dylan's trying to convince himself that this isn't going to be the single weirdest thing he's ever had to do in his life.

"No," Dylan says, sighing. "I'm a whole-ass adult. I can do this."

Mitch grins at him, bright and sweet, and leans in to kiss him briefly. "Go you!"

It relieves some of Dylan's tension, and he smiles back as he nods. "Okay. Doing this."

"Any second now," Mitch says, nodding back. "You're already going. So fast."

"I'm already gone," Dylan says, biting his smile back. "In fact, I actually already—"

"Stromer?" Dylan hears, soft and disbelieving, and Dylan turns and sees Connor for the first time in half a decade.

"Hey," he says weakly, raising a hand to wave. "How's, uh. How's it going?"

Connor looks good, is the thing, tall and built, soft-looking hair and gorgeous eyes. His beard could use a trim, but other than that, he's sixteen-year-old Dylan's everything, standing there wrapped up in an Oilers practise sweater and a frown.

"Not gonna lie, I was better about thirty seconds ago," Connor says after a moment. He looks both ways down the hall before stepping out and letting the locker room door close behind him. "I guess you guys are the new curse-breakers they brought in."

"We are," Mitch says, and Dylan's perfectly happy to let Mitch take the lead on this one. It's kind of shitty that he's still so into Connor's… everything, he thinks. He's with Mitch and he's _happy_ with Mitch and things with Connor had been weird even when they'd been good, but Dylan's probably always going to be himself, which means he's always going to be into Connor. Damn his stupid heart, anyway. "We've got… well."

Connor looks at Mitch, frown deepening, and then he looks at Dylan. "Guys," he says warningly.

"We need you," Mitch says, simple and direct. "We've got the elements, Davo, but—"

"I'm a hockey player," Connor insists, stepping closer to them. "I haven't done magic since…"

Connor trails off, and they both let him. Since Dylan and Mitch had fixed Connor's wrist strain, apprentice healers helping out the next star of the OHL; since Connor's magic had reared up out of him, wrapping itself neatly into Dylan's and making him stumble back; since Connor had held both hands out and whispered frantic incantations about _secrets_ and _hiding_ and _please_ that Dylan had acquiesced to without really thinking it through. Since Mitch had wound a few strands of copper together, clumsy and mostly guessing, and Dylan had wrapped his fingers around them and thought as hard as he could about containing things so others couldn't tell, and they'd placed it around Connor's wrist.

Dylan glances down; he has no idea what Connor had told the trainers and the team and the league as a whole, but he can see the copper still wrapped there.

"Connor," Dylan says, and his voice sounds strained now like it hadn't when he'd cleaned the taste of oil out of his mouth earlier. "We wouldn't be asking if we could do it ourselves."

Connor closes his eyes and stands still for a moment, then another, long enough that the locker room door opens up behind him and someone walks right into his back.

"Uh, what the fuck," Darnell Nurse says, frowning as he steps to Connor's side and surveys the scene. He shifts on his skates, and there's something a little predatory about it, like he's preparing for a lunge or a pounce of some sort. "Davo, man, if you need me to call security—"

"No," Connor says, and it sounds like it's being dragged out of him. "Nah, they're—this is Marns and Stromer. We've known each other for years."

"Hey, man," Mitch says, nodding at Nurse with an easy look on his face. "Nice goal last game. Fuck the Ducks, too."

"Never mind, they can stay," Nurse says immediately, face breaking into a grin. "Fuck the Ducks. You're so right, dude."

Mitch laughs, and Dylan lets himself relax, just a little. "I'm a man of taste," Mitch says lightly. "Speaking of which, we need Davo for a little while."

"Uh," Nurse says, glancing at Connor and then back at the locker room door. "We have… practise?"

"I'm gonna talk to Coach," Connor says, and Nurse blinks at him. "It's—shit, Nursey. Everything's fine, okay? Everything's…"

"Cursed to fuck and back," Mitch supplies.

Dylan groans. "Subtle," he says. "We're going to fix it, okay, that's what we do. We just need Connor to do it."

Nurse takes an immediate step back. "Dude, you're _cursed_?"'

"No," Connor says emphatically. "It's—look, later, okay? This is going to be shitty, but the sooner I do it, the sooner things will go back to normal, to how they're supposed to be."

"Okay," Nurse says, gaze darting from Connor to Mitch and Dylan and then back to Connor, around in a circle again and again. "You're sure everything's okay?"

"I'm sure it's going to be," Dylan says firmly. "You've got no reason to trust me on that, but I promise it's true."

"Okay," Nurse says again. "Good… uh, good luck?"

Mitch snorts. "Thanks," he says. "Just play hockey. We'll take care of the rest of it."

"That I can do," Nurse says, saluting them with his stick before finally turning and heading towards the ice.

-0-

"So," Connor says. He's stripped out of his practise jersey and pads, and honestly, the Under Armour look is making Dylan have a lot of uncomfortable thoughts. The cold comfort is that there's a kind of stunned expression on Mitch's face, too, so at least they can talk about the Connor McDavid's Muscles Admiration Society thing they've got going on here later.

"So," Dylan says. "You know something's seriously fucked here, right?"

Connor shrugs, looking uncomfortable. "I mean, yeah."

"And you knew they were calling in outside help?" Mitch asks.

"Yeah," Connor says again. "I had no idea it would be you guys."

Dylan bites the inside of his cheek hard for a second before nodding. "We'll be out of your hair soon, okay? We just need your help with this."

"Didn't you guys fix Denver?" Connor asks, glancing at Mitch. "This should hardly be anything after all that."

"I almost died," Mitch says, voice carefully blank. "So, like, yes. We technically fixed Denver."

"We don't want a repeat," Dylan says before Connor can do more than widen his eyes at Mitch's bombshell. He reaches out without looking and is immensely gratified when Mitch immediately grabs it. "We can set up all the spellwork, Connor. We're not asking you to learn a bunch of shit. We just need you to push your magic where we tell you to push it, and Mitch will do the same, and I'll work with what you give me to get rid of what's here."

Connor slumps back against the wall. They're in a training room mostly because it's the most private place they could find on short notice. "You're sure?"

"We're sure," Mitch says. "It's bad here, man. Dylan almost…"

Connor's gaze snaps to Dylan's in a heartbeat. "What? What happened?"

Dylan blows a bubble with his gum. "Oil," he says simply. "I didn't think ahead before I stepped into the building, and it almost choked me."

"Shit," Connor says weakly. He's toying with the copper on his wrist. " _Shit_."

"Yeah, that sums it up," Mitch says, sighing as he lets go of Dylan's hand. "We'll ward you, okay? We've got the gum, and I know we've got some basil pills and some sage cream stuff. You won't be in danger once you take the blocker off."

"I wish this wasn't happening," Connor says clearly. "But I'll help, okay? Whatever it takes to get this fixed, I'll help."

Dylan hadn't realised he was carrying tension in his shoulders until it suddenly releases, and it's like he can breathe easier all of a sudden. "Thank you," he says, relief clear in his voice. "We'll be as quick as we can, and then we'll get out of your city and you'll never have to see either one of us ever again."

Something flickers across Connor's face, a microexpression that Dylan might not even have noticed, except the six months between him and Mitch making Connor's blocker and Connor abruptly calling it all off had been filled with not going six hours without the three of them being together. Dylan doesn't know Connor like he knows Mitch, not anymore, but there had been a time where they'd all known each other equally well.

"Yeah," Connor says, saving Dylan from opening his mouth and asking what Connor's face had been doing there. "Okay. I guess we should get to it then, eh?"

"After practise," Mitch says, and there are a lot of reasons Dylan loves Mitch, but his ability to act like this isn't weird and awkward is front and centre right now. "We're gonna get out of here for a few hours, see what kinds of supplies we have and what we can scare up, and make a plan. Give me your number and we'll text you when we're ready, okay?"

Connor blinks. "You, uh," he says, looking down. "You don't still have it? My number?"

Something wild and crushing rises in Dylan's chest at the realisation that the number in his phone, the one he's had there for years and hasn't been able to delete, would have reached Connor at any point in the last half decade. He can tell it hits Mitch, too, but Mitch recovers first.

"Figured you'd trade in your juniors number for a shiny new one," he says, and it almost lands as a joke. It's close enough, and even Connor can sense how tense things here are, because he smiles even though it's not quite right.

"Nah, gotta stick with what you know," he says. "Just text me and let me know your new numbers, and I'll—"

Dylan laughs. "Dude, why would we have new numbers?"

Connor blinks like it honestly hadn't occurred to him that they'd also still have the same numbers. "Oh. Well, I mean, if it's the same, then I'll know who's texting me."

"Okay, cool," Mitch says, standing. "Then you can probably get back to the end of practise, and we'll raid every magic shop in Edmonton for their sage reserves."

"Good luck with that," Connor says, nodding. "I'll, uh. I'll see you later."

"Later," Dylan says, and he feels kind of odd as he stands abruptly and walks out of the training room, but he chews hard on his gum and tells himself that the mint is helping as he and Mitch make their way back to the parking garage.

-0-

"Why is he still hot?" Mitch asks the second their hotel room closes behind them. "Like, that's unfair, right? He shouldn't still be that hot in person."

"Not with that beard," Dylan agrees, flopping across the bed. "It's seriously unfair."

"Shit," Mitch says, sighing. "Glad I'm not the only one."

Dylan wiggles his fingers a little, and Mitch walks over and takes his hand. "You're not," he says. "Glad I'm not facing this whole thing on my own."

"Never on your own," Mitch promises, and they just smile at each other for a moment. "Let's figure out what we need to do before I do something stupid like forget he broke our hearts, okay?"

"Sounds like a plan," Dylan agrees, sitting up. "What do we have and what do we need?"

They spend almost an hour planning out the best course of attack, and then they split up to hunt down whatever they can get their hands on. Dylan has a list of herbs that would be as long as his arm if it wasn't stored on his phone, and Mitch is going to a bunch of big box stores to see what he can find that will work to supplement what they have going on. He'd been muttering something about bath salts when he left, and Dylan knows way better by now than to ask.

Three hours after they left, they're back at Rogers Place, shopping bags in hand. Dylan's pretty sure he's going to smell like salad for a week, but he gets to work measuring and grinding, silently passing things to Mitch and holding his hand out for whatever Mitch passes back in return. There's a lot of give and take in magic, a lot of balancing and making sure things match, and Dylan thinks that's why he and Mitch work so well together; it isn't easy, but they can always figure out how to make it work. It hadn't been easier before, with Connor, but—

Dylan firmly stops that train of thought. He needs to concentrate on what he's doing, not all the thoughts and feelings surrounding having to actually work with Connor on this. Hopefully they'll be done with all of this tonight, and then they can just go their separate ways, and nobody will have to think about anybody they don't want to be thinking about.

"Okay," Mitch says, cutting into Dylan's train of thought. He's frowning down into two bowls, one filled with what looks like green sand and the other with white sand. Both of the bowls reek like mint, and Dylan's glad he hadn't asked about the bath salts before. "I'm gonna get started on the perimeters. You good to keep going here?"

"I'm almost done," Dylan says, looking into his own bowl. The herb paste mixture he's got going looks supremely unappetizing, but he doesn't need to eat it, just to spread it in the key points they'd identified earlier in their plan. "Have you texted Connor?"

Mitch grimaces. "Not yet."

Dylan nods, short and sharp. "I will," he says. "Go do the salt thing. I've got this."

"You sure?" Mitch asks, stepping closer for a moment. "I can—"

"Go," Dylan says firmly.

Mitch nods, then picks up the bowls, balancing one inside the other as he walks out of the room.

Dylan stirs his herb paste a few more times before reaching for his phone. Connor's number is just saved under his first name, no emojis or memes or anything with it; it's easier to hide something in plain sight, and Dylan didn't need to learn magic to figure that out. He taps out a quick text— _gonna be ready here in about an hour, please come over_ —and sends it before putting his phone back down and lifting his bowl. He's got a lot of herb goop to spread around.

It's actually kind of relaxing, once he gets into the swing of things. He's got enough mint in his system to keep the curse at bay, which means he can feel out where Mitch is, feel where he needs to put the paste in relation to where the salt lines are being drawn. It's almost instinct, and Dylan can absolutely relax into it as he makes his way around Rogers Place, circling down and down until he and Mitch are at centre ice, Mitch muttering as he sprinkles salt and Dylan stooping to smear the last of his herb paste across the logo.

"So, uh," Dylan hears when he leans back to survey his work. He glances up at the bench, where Connor is standing with his hands in his pockets. "You guys have gotten a little fancier since… since we were younger."

"Nothing but the best for you," Mitch says without looking up. He's eyeing his salt lines kind of critically; Mitch is quick and precise, but he double-checks his work anyway, and Dylan leaves him to it every time. He stands all the way up and picks his way back to the bench, stepping over what he and Mitch had laid down on their way out there.

"So, all of the components are set out," he says as he stops near Connor. "We'll get you in position, and honestly, your magic should just do what it needs to do once you take the blocker off."

"Which you should not do yet," Mitch adds, coming to a stop beside Dylan. He reaches into a pocket and pulls out a baggie; there are two basil pills inside, along with three sticks of spearmint gum and a little jar of sage paste. Mitch hands over the pills, which Connor dry-swallows without question, and then he opens the jar and digs his thumb in. Connor doesn't blink as Mitch draws a line across his forehead with the paste, then dots some on the back of each hand. Finally, Mitch holds out the baggie with the gum. "Chew it. All of it, at the same time."

"You have weird magic," Connor says, and Dylan flashes back to Connor saying the same exact thing, all of them younger, all of them thinking they were on top of the world. He forces himself to ignore it, though, and just shrugs as Mitch laughs.

"Ready?" Mitch asks. "Everything's set, and doing this before anyone else gets here is probably for the best."

"Let's do it," Connor says decisively. "Where do I need to be?"

"Out here," Dylan says, taking a step back. "Don't walk on the salt lines."

"Do not," Mitch stresses. "Don't kick them at all."

Connor laughs and swings himself over the boards. "Okay, got it."

Dylan leads him to the logo, positioning him with one foot on either side of the red line. Mitch mirrors him, and Dylan carefully walks to the very centre, turning in a slow circle before lowering himself to the ice.

"Okay," Mitch says, and this time it's Dylan who can see through Mitch's false bravado. "We're gonna pour magic into the spell, and Dylan's gonna make it all work. On three, Connor, got it?"

"Got it," Connor confirms.

"One, two," Mitch says. He hesitates for half a second, then says, "three," and there's light, light everywhere, blue and white and orange and Dylan inhales, long and steady, and lets his breath out, pushing it along the salt lines and into the herbs. The herbal smell explodes around them, sweet and sharp and savoury all at once, and Dylan breathes it in and back out, pushing the magic farther and farther away from himself, feeling the oil dry up and dissolve and break down where it had leached into the bedrock. He feels it all _working_ , clean and crisp and perfect, and he keeps breathing it in and out, pushing it where he needs it until he can feel the last of the curse snap and wither.

"Whoa," he breathes out, finally drawing back, and he looks up just in time to see Connor collapse to the ice.

-0-

"McDavid," Nicholson says, and it's less weary and more astonished than anything Dylan's heard out of his mouth so far. "Your curse guy is _McDavid_?"

Dylan shifts on his feet, watching as Connor talks with one of the Oilers' trainers. She's doing a concussion test, which is smart even though Dylan's pretty sure he doesn't feel anything other than exhaustion wrong with Connor. The magic is still thrumming inside him, and he's gonna figure out how to give some of it back to Connor so he looks a little less dead on his feet as soon as the trainer lets them get close to him.

"I think he prefers just being a hockey player," Mitch offers. "Like, I'm really, really sure that's what he prefers, actually. He would love it if you forgot about this whole magic thing."

"He would," Dylan confirms. "And you absolutely can't ask him to just fix shit if it goes wrong again. That's what we're for."

Nicholson chuckles, and it's a little strained. "You work out of Toronto," he says. "That's not exactly close."

"We will relocate here before we'll let you put this on his shoulders," Mitch says. The most dangerous tone of voice he has is the one where it's perfectly flat and even, and Nicholson must know it, because he blinks at Mitch.

"Or we'll make you forget he has it," Dylan says, soft enough that Connor and the trainer definitely won't be able to overhear.

Nicholson startles. "You can't—that's illegal, tampering with memory."

Mitch gives him the ghost of a smile. "We've done it for him before."

The Otters' trainer, Dylan remembers. The guy had been there when Mitch and Dylan had healed Connor, had seen his magic leap from him and react, had looked at Connor with amazement and started talking rapidly about magical training and specialised supervision, and Dylan—he hadn't thought, hadn't stopped to consider it, had just reached out and taken the guy's hand and said, firm but sure, "Connor just plays hockey."

And he had, and he does, and Dylan and Mitch know how to wield their magic even better, now.

"Okay, okay," Nicholson says, stepping back. "Were you… were you serious about relocating? Because we'd pay your expenses, work out a contract. That's a hell of a thing you boys got rid of in less than a day."

Dylan turns, and Mitch is already looking back at him. "Maybe," Mitch says after a moment. "We'd need to talk to Connor."

"Let me know," Nicholson says, nodding at them. "I think he's finally free, if you wanted to have that conversation now."

Dylan snorts. "We'll let you know," he says, and there's enough residual magic in him and in the air around them to make Nicholson turn and walk away without another word.

"Nice," Mitch says approvingly. "Let's talk to him, okay? And then we can decide whether or not I was bluffing about us moving to Edmonton."

"Yeah," Dylan agrees, turning to walk towards Connor. He's pale as hell, but the closer Dylan gets to him, the more he can tell it's nothing more than exhaustion, five years' worth of pent-up magic all rushing out at once. "Hey. Sorry about the, uh…"

"Fainting?" Connor supplies, grinning a little weakly as he leans back against the wall. "That was on me, I'm pretty sure."

Dylan laughs. "You said it, not me."

"Got a clean bill of health?" Mitch asks, leaning in a little. "I can probably mix something up for you, if we can find more mint. It might not be until tomorrow, because I think we actually bought all of the mint in Edmonton, but Sobey's said they were getting more in on their shipment in the morning."

Connor laughs. "I'll be fine," he says.

"Actually," Dylan says. He holds his hand out, wiggling his fingers. The magic doesn't glow like it had out on the ice, but he feels it in his fingertips all the same, and when Connor reaches out cautiously, Dylan thinks _heal_ as hard as he can, and Connor gasps as his cheeks return to their normal colour.

"Oh," Connor says softly. He's holding Dylan's hand now, looking a little dazed. "Wow."

"I'm good like that," Dylan says lightly. He doesn't want to tug his hand away, to break this fragile-seeming connection, not while Connor is smiling up at him. "Feel better?"

"Sorry," Connor says, and before Dylan can ask him what he's apologising for, he's leaning in and kissing Dylan, soft but firm, pulling back before Dylan can do anything like unfreeze from the shock.

"What," Dylan says. "Connor."

Mitch laughs a little unsteadily from Dylan's side. "What, he's suddenly your favourite?"

Connor smiles, brief and pained, before turning to Mitch. He leans in, cupping Mitch's face in one hand before kissing him, a little longer, a little deeper. "Sorry," he says again as he pulls back. "I'm—I was an idiot."

"Please be more specific," Dylan says, feeling like his voice is getting caught on nothing in his throat, knowing it's a hell of an emotional surge it's getting caught on.

"I was an idiot," Connor says. "I was scared, and you guys were so good, just the two of you, and I thought I could just… remove myself from the situation, and you'd be fine."

Mitch makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat, and Dylan agrees wholeheartedly.

"And then you _were_ good, and I was… I was doing fine, and then you showed up here," Connor goes on, smiling briefly. "And I was still fine, but I couldn't keep a lid on all the what-ifs and regrets when you guys were standing in front of me, and I know I don't have any right to—"

Mitch goes up on his toes and kisses Connor, and Dylan… agrees wholeheartedly.

"So Nicholson sort of offered us a job out here," Dylan says when Mitch pulls back, grinning up at an astonished Connor. "We were going to ask you if it would be too awkward, and then we were gonna discuss it between the two of us."

"Here," Connor echoes, smile spreading slowly across his face. "Like, in Edmonton? You'd move here and just be here all the time?"

"Most of the time," Mitch says. "We travel every so often for work. Not as often as you, but still."

"You'd be okay with that?" Dylan asks, because he knows better than to take anything but a firm, clear answer as a yes. "And you'd want to—to try again?"

"Yes, oh my god," Connor says, full-on beaming now. "This is—really? Like, really-really?"

"Yes, Shrek, really-really," Mitch says, and he's smiling and Connor's smiling and Dylan's cheeks hurt from how hard he's smiling, and—

And, well. Dylan hasn't gotten a second kiss from Connor yet, and that hardly seems fair, so he leans in to fix that problem. The rest can wait.

**Author's Note:**

> -and they moved to edmonton and lived HAPPILY EVER AFTER!!!!
> 
> -let it be known that mitch and nursey start every conversation they ever have with each other with "fuck the ducks, man."


End file.
